out the harbour would continue to be most valuable; and in fact their efficiency would be very much increased by their having some definite Chaplain by whom they would in each case be directed in their work, and to whom they would refer it. One detail must not be omitted, if this arrangement is to prove of any practical value. These Chaplains would require facilities in the way of boats, and should be authorized, we think, to employ shore boats on occasions when a ship's boat could not conveniently be placed at their disposal.

We now revert to the case of our large Naval Hospitals as spheres inadequately supplied with clerical ministration. The Chaplain who holds daily service for the convalescents in the chapel, in accordance with the habit of seamen afloat, who visits the wards as they ought to be visited, being always at hand by the bedside of the suffering and dying, and who fulfils all other parts of his duty, finds the work too much for him single-handed for any continued length of time. The consequence has been that some portion of this work has been generally dispensed with, and the aid of Scripture Readers been found very necessary, and in some cases much unwillingly left to them which would have been much better discharged personally by a clergyman. The defect could be corrected by a plan that would at the same time relieve a real pecuniary grievance of the Chaplains, and be productive of other good results. The work of a Chaplain of a hospital is very depressing; and to do it efficiently, he, of all people, requires a certain amount of leave during the year, especially as he is often not a young man, and has seen generally some twenty years' active service. Unlike, however, any other officer attached to these establishments, when he goes away to recruit, he has to find and pay a locum tenens. In connection with this, bear in mind the fact that there are always several junior Chaplains on half-pay; and though even upon the scale just published their full pay is not excessive, their often remaining for months together unemployed materially diminishes their average income. The inference is obvious. Junior Chaplains, for whom there was no immediate demand for independent appointments, instead of being, as now, placed on half-pay, should be retained on full-pay, and some of them sent to work at the hospitals under the per manent Chaplain. This would afford great relief to the senior Chaplains, by lightening their regular work, and enabling them to get away with comfort to refresh themselves; and also prove a great advantage to the junior Chaplains, not only in a pecuniary point of view, but also by initiating them, under their elders, into posts they themselves look forward to fill hereafter. Some of these available Chaplains might be also at times found useful in taking the place of other of the harbour Chaplains

when these go on leave, so that the important interests we have shown above should be placed under their charge would not suffer by their absence.

There is still a topic to notice of which we are reminded by some passages in the Journal described at the commencement of our article. After distributing 500 books among the ship's crew, the Chaplain of the Ranelagh, in 1704, writes to Dr. Manningham for some more "pious treatises," which he received in about three weeks' time. The supply of such "pious treatises" to the Navy is admirably provided for by our present regulations. Up to a few years ago the Seamen's Library contained a certain proportion of well selected religious books; but these were the same for every ship, and were in due course all of them read by those men who read any of them. It was felt that many new works had appeared which it would be well to add to the list; but instead of doing this uniformly for every ship, a better plan was adopted, which ensured a larger list and a greater variety in the service at large. Retaining a few of the old ones on the permanent list, every Chaplain was empowered in addition to purchase religious books to the extent of £1 for every 100 men of the complement for the ship's commission. Of course he could expend a portion of this sum on what are known as "Tracts." The distribution of tracts. among people with whom they can always hold personal intercourse, is felt by many clergymen to be a lazy and poor way of doing work-substituting a dead proxy for living ministration; nevertheless most clergymen know their value in assisting and supplementing oral teaching if well selected, and selected by themselves, each for his own cure. That portion of our seamen who when at sea must necessarily be without a Chaplain, and for whom the employment of these little religious books seems especially suited, are provided for in an equally judicious manner; there are tracts liberally supplied to them, which are carefully selected by the Chaplain of Greenwich Hospital.

All that tends to raise the social and intellectual condition of our seamen, all that provides them with innocent amusement and rational recreation, concerns the Chaplain. Good wholesome reading of a secular character has had no small share in bringing about the improvement which has taken place in the habits of our seamen, and the Pure Literature Society has been of great assistance here. The Chaplain has scope for immense usefulness on board by encouraging and aiding Reading Clubs, Evening Readings and Lectures, Compassionate Funds, Benefit Societies, Temperance Societies, Canteens. Space will not allow us to describe what has been done of late years in these directions, nor to speak of the schools afloat which are placed under the Chaplain's care. Education has done more than

anything else to banish folly where folly was once rife; and owing to the establishment of training ships, in which the schools are admirably managed and eminently successful, the greater regularity with which the boys' school has been held on board sea-going ships, ensured by the Chaplain's report on his duties above refered to, and the establishment of voluntary evening schools for the men, the educational state of the Navy is very different from what it formerly was. This, and their religious condition, have advanced together, the two mutually supporting and reacting upon each other. Though, however, connected in more ways than one with our present subject, we must not touch upon the question of the education of our seamen. This would require a separate article to do it justice.

POSTSCRIPT. Since this article left the writer's hands, the Admiralty have issued a circular on the duties, &c., of Chaplains. It forms an appropriate conclusion to the above, and we therefore print it in full.

"DUTIES, &c., OF CHAPLAINS.

"1. My Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty deem it most desirable that the administration of the Holy Communion should take place with regularity on board Her Majesty's Ships bearing Chaplains, and every facility for its monthly celebration is to be afforded by the Commanding Officer.

"2. Whenever the Chaplain of one of Her Majesty's Ships shall have ascertained that a portion of the crew are anxious to be allowed a place of meeting for the purposes of prayer, or for consulting him, he is to make the same known to the Commanding Officer, who will give permission for a part of the half-deck, or some other appropriate place, to be screened off during such time and at such hours as he, the Commanding Officer, may deem expedient.

"3. When Scripture Readers are admitted on board Her Majesty's Ships, the Chaplain is to take care that they are not allowed to circulate unauthorized tracts, or to perform duties which strictly and essentially belong to the office of an ordained person. In her Majesty's Ships not having a Chaplain, the Commanding Officer will see that this regulation is not infringed.

"4. In the event of several of Her Majesty's Ships being together, the Senior Officer present will make the best possible arrangements for the attendance at Divine Service of the Officers and Men of the Church of England belonging to Ships in which no Chaplain is borne.

"5. For this purpose, the Chaplains are to be considered at the disposal of such Senior Officer, who will give such orders as he may think fit as to the time at which Divine Service is to be performed on board the respective Ships, and for the attendance of the Officers and Men belonging to Ships not bearing a Chaplain,-my Lords considering it better to bring the Men together in large congregations on board a few Ships than that separate Services should be held (perhaps at inconvenient hours) on board each.

"6. Chaplains are also to visit the sick and others who may require spiritual assistance on board Ships other than that to which they may belong, as well as such as may be sick in Hospitals or elsewhere on shore.

"7. The services of all Chaplains belonging to Her Majesty's Ships, whether at Sea or in Port, are to be at the disposal of the Commander-in-Chief, or Senior Officer present, who may give such orders as he may think advisable for the distribution of their duty, with reference to sickness, attendance on board small Ships, leave of absence, &c.

"8. With reference to Article 406, page 131 of the Addenda to the Queen's Regulations, 1868, Chaplains, in future, are to have the first choice of cabins after the Senior Executive Officer under the Captain, and the Senior Navigating Officer, have been provided for."

PROTESTANT NON-ESTABLISHED EPISCOPAL CHURCHES.

No. VI.

THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND IN JAMAICA.

WE close our series of articles on Protestant Non-Established Episcopal Churches with the notice of a Church which, though in point of magnitude it can compare with none of the Churches which we have hitherto considered, yet, on account of the peculiar difficulties of its present situation and the energy which it has displayed in endeavouring to surmount them, may well be regarded as having large claims upon our attention and sympathy. We allude to the branch of our own Church in Jamaica, which, after being connected with the State from the first settlement of the island, has been recently visited with disestablishment and disendowment.

The first bishoprics in the West Indies, those of Jamaica and of Barbadoes and the Leeward Islands, were created by letters patent in 1824, and in 1825 an endowment was, under Stat. 6 Geo IV., c. 88, bestowed on the West Indian Church, by the appropriation, out of the Consolidated Fund, of the net annual sum of £20,300, to be divided among the bishops and archdeacons, and a stated number of ministers and catechists of the two dioceses, while a further provision was made for the pension, under certain circumstances, of retiring bishops.*

*The policy of thus strengthening the West Indian Church by State aid, was inaugurated by a speech of Mr. Canning, then Foreign Secretary, delivered in the House of Commons on

the 16th of March, 1824,-a speech containing sentiments in marked contrast to those which unhappily are now widely prevalent. Among other measures proposed by the Government

This grant was confirmed, with a variation in the mode of its distribution, by an Act of the following year (Stat. 7 Geo. IV., c. 4). In 1842, a further Act (Stat. 5 & 6 Vict. c. 4) was passed respecting the Church in the West Indies, which authorised the creation of new bishoprics and archdeaconries within the limits of those previously existing, and the endowment of the former by the subdivision of the sums appropriated to the latter, and sanctioned a similar redistribution of the money allotted to the salaries of ministers and catechists among a larger number of recipients; at the same time repealing, as to all future bishops, the former statutory provision for their penUnder this Act two new West Indian dioceses, those of Nassau and Antigua, and a third on the neighbouring coast of South America, that of British Guiana, have been added to those originally created, and have shared with them the £8000 annually applicable out of the Endowment Fund to the maintenance of the Episcopacy. Two coadjutor bishops-those of Kingston in Jamaica, and Barbadoes-complete the present number of the West Indian bishops.

sions.

The above-mentioned provisions of the Imperial legislature represent only a small portion of the State aid of which the West Indian Church has hitherto been in receipt. The Colonies themselves contributed to its support, through their respective legislatures, a yearly sum which in the year 1868 amounted to about £60,000. The portion of the Jamaica revenues appropriated for the purposes of the Church in that island was, in the year 1864, £37,956; and this Church, receiving as it did £7100 as its share of the Imperial grant, was thus at that time in the enjoyment of State endowment to the annual amount of above £45,000, which supported a staff of ninety-two clergymen, besides catechists and officials discharging secular duties in connection with the Church. The colonial portion of this endowment was granted under the provisions of the Jamaica "Clergy Act 1858" (Jam. Stat. 22 Vict. cap. 23), of which the duration was, like that of previous statutes by which the ecclesiastical arrangements of the Colony had been regulated, limited to a definite period, instead of being only liable to be concluded by a positive repeal; and was destined, in the absence of renewal, to expire on the 31st of December, 1869. In view of the near approach of this date,

"for ameliorating the condition of the Slave Population" in the West India Colonies, he mentions "a religious establishment and religious instruction," and affirms that "to provide the means of religious instruction and worship is an object first in importance." (Hansard's Parl. Deb., N. S., vol. 10, pp. 1091

1112.) In the present day the disestablishment of religion is looked upon as the first step to be taken towards the conciliation of a disaffected people and the improvement of their condition; and there are amongst us many who regard a purely secular edu cation as the panacea for all social evils.